Three years ago, while courting my current girlfriend, I took the nofap challenge in order to deal with the ED and delayed ejaculation problems that had been plaguing me for many, many years (I was 36 at the time). I’ve been fapping to porn since I was 15 years old and while the physical consequences were very apparent whenever I tried to have sex with real women, the psychological problems took a back seat.
See, I thought that most of my insecurities and hangups with women were attributable to my low self-esteem, lack of experience or “taste” in women (none of them were ever quite good enough), and went into the reboot with the primary goal of getting my junk in top shape. It worked wonders and when we finally hooked up, our sex was fantastic and has been ever since.
And that’s where things got even more complicated.
Basically I relapsed within a couple months of us being together because of the false sense of security that our sex life provided. As long as things in bed were ok, getting back into the porn fapping game was ok. How very, very wrong I was.
Now, it’s important to note that our relationship has not been easy and there have been many stressors and conflicts that have been really hard to deal with. Fapping became a stress relief as well as a way to get back at her when she pissed me off. But whenever we kissed and made up, I never had any performance issues, so I kept consuming and it started to hit very unhealthy levels. And that’s when the grey started setting in: lack of motivation, lack of confidence, lack of direction, confusion, etc…It started affecting my work life, my creative life and, of course, my relationship. But it wasn’t until last week that I acknowledged these truths and that I was effectively a porn addict (which I didn’t acknowledge during my first reboot).
Five days ago, after a particularly vengeful session of PMO, I came across Terry Crews’ video through /r/pcmasterrace about his PC build and that led me to his YouTube channel and his videos discussing his porn addiction. I really appreciated the candor with which he came across discussing it and something clicked inside of me that I needed to get re-educated about porn addiction and the psychological effects that it has on the user. And that’s what I’ve been doing ever since.
I came out to my GF about my problem (though, unfortunately, it does not look like our relationship is going to make it) as well as my parents and just doing that lifted so much stress and anxiety that I’ve been finally able to sleep properly through the night for the first time in months. So basically I’m back on the wagon this time to reboot the deeper problem of addiction. I know from experience that its a wild ride, but more importantly I know that there is a better way to feel about yourself and the people that you love and I’m feeling confident that I can beat it (no pun intended).
Thanks for reading and looking forward to getting it right this time around 🙂
TL/DR: Rebooted successfully 3 years ago to cure ED and delayed ejaculation issues, relapsed hard due to false sense of security and complicated relationship, back on the wagon to cure the addiction.
LINK – My Story or A Tale of Two Faps
by audioman22
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